It’s the almost imperceptible stuff schoolteachers aren’t likely to notice, often allowing girl-on-girl bullying to fly under the radar of adults.

“Boys are more overt — a whole other nature/nurture sort of problem — and more likely to get in trouble at school,” Dr Runions adds.

“I guess it’s also important to remember you can do relational stuff without it being super secret, and boys might be more comfortable being overt with that.

“They might just say ‘You can’t play with us because you’re weak’, and maybe boys are just more likely to come out and say it to other boys which is a relational moment of bullying, but just not covert.

“Or, you could take the kid behind the schoolyard to beat them up, or you can have a fight and beat them up in front of everybody like in the movies — Karate Kid, for instance.

Camera IconBoys can be every bit as psychologically brutal as girls.Picture: Getty Images

“It is changing quickly but we’re still in a very hyper- masculinised culture in WA — of sport and athletics — and if you are not that person and not interested in that then you are a target, to some extent, or more likely to be one.”

Just as boys who don’t conform to socially accepted standards of masculinity are more likely to be targeted, so is any boy who doesn’t conform to the cookie-cutter notion of a “normal” kid.

“One of the things we see, particularly in boys, is their inability to tolerate difference,” explains Dr Michael Carr-Gregg, a child and adolescent psychologist and member of the National Centre Against Bullying.

“You tend to see the people who get bullied are quite clearly kids who are different.

“They can be too fat, too thin, too short, have glasses and pimples or a skin condition. Or you can be different because you come from a different country and have a different skin colour or physical things.

“Psychologically, for example, you might be a bit shy, or too extrovert and if you don’t sort of conform ... then you are very likely to attract this sort of negative attention.”

Dr Carr-Gregg is convinced learning more about the impact poor sleep quality has on boys could offer up some possible clues about boys and aggression.

British researchers at Oxford University have conducted sleep studies that found a major problem among boys who bully is sleep deprivation, he says.

If you don’t get enough sleep, and remember kids need nine hours, you are going to wake up more irritable, more grumpy and a lot less tolerant. So one of the things I’d love to see here in Australia is some serious research around the impact of sleep deprivation and its clear association, in my view, with this type of bullying behaviour.Dr Carr-Gregg

At this point, status, or gaining a position of popularity, is accepted as the main motivation for bullying, irrespective of gender.

However, Dr Runions is interested to learn about other motivations. The problem is, it can be difficult to recruit people who bully for studies to learn about why they do it, because most are not willing to openly admit they do it in the first place.

What the evidence does reveal is that children who are bullied are at an increased risk of bullying others.

“I also don’t think the researchers recognise the fun value of bullying for kids enough. They get that thrill value,” Dr Runions says.

“I also think revenge doesn’t get enough attention.

“I think maybe bullies are able to switch off their empathy and disengage. So, they know it is wrong to be a bully, in theory, but in this case that is not what they are doing because that kid deserved it or that is not what they were doing because it was just a joke, or because, because, because.”

While research is ongoing, many schools still take a simplistic “no sticks and stones” approach, he says, and this is problematic because there is enough evidence to show that bullying is usually insidious and complex.

The “no sticks and stones” type policies also tend to be the reason so many boys are marched to the principal’s office while, presumably, there are girls still out in the playground being just as mean.

“Smart bullies learn very quickly to be very subtle and devious and to do it behind the back of the teacher and adults, in particular,” Dr Runions explains.

“The bullying that happens between girls is also much less likely to be caught and acted upon because it’s more subtle.

“Some girls are able to be super nice selectively and super mean selectively, and even though boys are capable of that too when schools clamp down on punishing bullies what you are getting is they are clamping down on the dumbest, if you will, bullies in the school.

“This pulls up a social justice anger in me because these are the kids who continue to lack the psychological control to take their bullying into a different modality, which is away from the physical to a more subtle thing.

“I know boys from rougher, poorer backgrounds are more likely to lack the self-control skills to be able to switch that around because of their upbringing.”

Interestingly, until about the mid-90s, research around bullying focused almost entirely on boys and aggression. Then further studies revealed girls were, in fact, being just as aggressive, just in a different way.

“I think it’s an equal opportunity issue, sadly,” Dr Carr-Gregg says.

There is not a big difference in boys’ and girls’ manipulative bullying but it might be that the girls use it earlier and that they really commit to it.Dr Kevin Runions

Dr Carr-Gregg says boys and girls in primary school have brains that are still developing, meaning they can’t fully predict the consequences of their actions or properly appreciate another person’s perspective.

“To understand and empathise with people is particularly developing towards the end of Year Eight and Nine,” he explains. “And that is why we get these peaks of bullying, particularly around transition times, because kids are impulsive, heavily influenced by peers and don’t have that capacity to empathise quite in the same way the older kids do.”

He says Years Five, Six, Seven and Eight are peak times for bullying. While bullying does happen in Year Nine, he says educators report it drops off in senior school as kids mature, their priorities change and their capacity to tolerate difference grows.

Crucially, the way an individual boy will respond to being bullied depends on a complex mix of risk and protective factors.

“It depends on how resilient he is and, does he have a charismatic adult in his life from whom he can draw strength,” Dr Carr-Gregg says.

“Does he have a set of social and emotional competencies which would allow him to cope with this?

“Does he have a self-thought which is relatively flexible rather than inflexible?

“Is he good at something else so that he has islands of confidence which he can basically use to get his units of recognition from.

“And, does he have a greater sense of meaning, purpose and belonging so he feels a sense of belonging to something bigger than himself?

“All of those are protective factors because the way in which an individual boy will respond is highly dependent on risk and protective factors in his own inner world, his family world, his school world and his peer world.”

Bullying alert

Problem: My son is being bullied. What can I do to help?

TRY:

Talk to him. Make sure he knows you and everyone else around him at home care, are concerned, and will help if you can.

Make sure this is “bullying” and not a conflict. Bullying is marked by someone who has more power deliberately trying to harm someone who has less power, and probably doing so repeatedly. Power is complicated but it can include perceived status or popularity and/or physical strength.

Make sure your son isn’t being aggressive or violent to others. Some kids “provoke” bullying in others through acting out of control or deliberately annoying their peers. This isn’t blaming the victim, it’s recognising that not all problems are black and white, and sometimes the finger can’t clearly be pointed at just one party.

If your child has a smartphone or uses social media on a computer, set up a “common area” policy. This is the 21st century, and these technologies aren’t going away, but if phones go in a basket when at home and computer use is in common areas then cyberbullying won’t be a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week possibility.

If he plays online games of the MMORPG variety (and if you don’t know what that means, find out now), be aware these are also social networks and bullying can happen within them.

Whether you’re a boy at the receiving end of a bully or a parent watching on helplessly as your son struggles, more is now known about male bullying — and that means more ways to stamp it out.

Why are boys bullied?

It pretty much comes down to being “different”.

Difference comes in many shapes and sizes, and what is considered “different” can vary from school to school. What is considered an “important” difference is the question.

For example, children with chronic health conditions such as hearing loss may be targeted.

But in other cases, the class may rally around a child with complex health needs, and bullying may not be an issue.

In general though, a common source of this “difference” is not being seen as masculine enough by the others.

Boys who don’t conform to traditional notions of manliness are at particular risk.

Problem: My son is not naturally a talker. How do I engage him so I know what is happening in his life?

TRY:

Understand that even if he’s not talking, it doesn’t mean he’s not listening. Even if you feel like you’re talking to a wall, he’s probably taking some of it in. The message you want to convey is: “I’m here for you, if and when you need it.” This probably trumps everything.

Pick your battles. Talking to a stone wall can be frustrating. Consider giving your son a bit more space and be choosy in picking your moments to try to get through.

Reward them for opening up. It may not take explicit bribery but consider how you react when your son does try to talk about important things. If you are too vocal in your judgments, too keen in offering solutions, he may come to regret saying anything at all, and shut down further.

Get Dad (or whoever is a sort of father figure) on the same page. Support from their dad has been shown to help for boys who are being targeted by bullying. Some boys may not feel that their mum, or women in general, can relate.

Do things with your son that he enjoys (even if you don’t). Some kids will open up when you are beside them doing stuff and not in front of them trying to ‘have a talk’.

Ask his friends. If you are concerned, maybe his friends are too, and are more ready to work with you to help understand your son.

Friends: Especially for younger boys, parents have power in being encouraging of some friendships over others. If you think your son’s “friends” are actually not ideal for him, you have the power to serve as “gatekeeper” for those relationships in terms of play dates and hanging-out time outside school. Be careful though — with this great power comes great responsibility, and if your son ends up resenting you, it won’t help in the long run.

Three signs your son is being bullied

Avoiding school without explanation, including from frequent minor illnesses that prevent school attendance.

An unexplained decrease in interest in much of anything or other signs of depression, or a spike in anxiety and worries, problems with sleep quality, or unexplained problems at school. All these sorts of problems can come up without bullying being a part of your son’s life but being bullied does make them more likely.

Other parents or teachers are saying your child is aggressive or a bully. Some targets of bullying have difficulties controlling anger and aggression, which leads to them being targeted themselves. Compared with kids who aren’t involved in bullying at all, our research suggests that teenagers who see themselves only as targets of bullying are more likely to have trouble with aggression themselves, including aggression motivated by revenge.